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  Article updated: September 27, 2023

Publish a video to YouTube

You can publish or schedule videos to your YouTube channels from Hootsuite, and then easily share the video URL in posts to your other social accounts.

Note: Team, Business, and Enterprise plan members need Editor or Advanced permissions to publish videos to a YouTube channel.

Video file requirements

  • File types - mp4, m4v.
  • Max file size - 1 GB.
  • Max video length - 15 minutes. You can upload longer videos with a verified YouTube account. For more information, see the Google help article Upload videos longer than 15 minutes.
  • Aspect ratio - 16:9. If your file is not 16:9, YouTube adds space on the sides of your video so it displays correctly without cropping or stretching.

You can also use formatting tags to change the appearance and format of your video when it's published. For more information, see the Google help article Add tags to videos.

Watch Best practices for creating and sharing content on YouTube for great publishing guidance. Visit Hootsuite Academy to watch more videos, take courses, or earn industry-recognized certifications.

Before you begin

Make sure you’ve already added your YouTube channel to Hootsuite. See Add a YouTube channel.

Publish or schedule your YouTube video

  1. Select Composer, and then select YouTube video. The YouTube video option is only available when you have a YouTube channel connected to Hootsuite.
    The YouTube video option highlighted on the Create menu.
  2. Drag a video into the upload area or select choose a file to upload to YouTube and then select your video.
  3. Select the YouTube channel you want to publish to.
  4. Enter a title for your video in the Title field.
  5. Optional: Enter a video description and tags, and select a category for the video.
    Tags are not displayed publicly, but they can help make your video easier to discover.
  6. Optional: If you have a verified YouTube account, you can select a video thumbnail by using the left and right arrows (see the Google help article Upload videos longer than 15 minutes).
  7. Select a privacy setting. You can schedule Unlisted or Private videos to go public at a later date and time. Turn on Schedule to go Public, and then select a date and time.
    YouTube video privacy settings.
  8. Select Done or Schedule in the top right to publish or schedule your video. You'll get an embed code that you can insert into a website and the YouTube video URL that you can share to other social accounts.
    Pop-up with YouTube video thumbnail, embed code, and video URL.
  9. Select Share via Hootsuite to create a new post and automatically insert the video URL in the Content area. See Create and publish posts to learn more.

Note: A video cannot be uploaded to the same YouTube channel more than once. YouTube removes duplicate videos.

All published and scheduled videos appear immediately in your My Videos stream. See Add a YouTube stream to learn how to create a My Videos stream. Thumbnails for Unlisted and Public videos are visible in streams, and you can view Private videos from your Hootsuite streams if you are also signed in to the YouTube channel in the same browser.

Tip: Looking for YouTube Analytics? You can monitor and track engagement on your videos and channels with the Channelview apps available in Hootsuite Apps.

 

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